 A very good evening aspirants, welcome to Hindu newspaper analysis brought to you by Shankarai's Academy for the date 9th of June 2022. Displayed here are the list of articles that we are going to discuss today. Without any delay, let's get into the article discussion. See this news article here. It is from the text and context page. See this news article talks about secularism. The debate over secularism and religious tolerance has resurfaced due to BJP spokesperson's remarks about Prophet Muhammad and Islam. And after this, several West Asian countries have condemned his remarks. So this is the crux of the news article given here. In this backdrop, let us see some of the important points that are mentioned in the news article. But before that, the syllabus relevant to the news article is given here for your reference. Just go through it. First of all, what is secularism? See secularism is a normative doctrine which seeks to realize a secular society, that is a society devoid of either inter-religious or intra-religious domination. Inter-religious domination means one particular religion dominating every other religion. Intra-religious domination means domination existing within a particular religion. To put it positively, secularism promotes freedom within religions and it also promotes equality between as well as within religions. So here comes the question. What kind of state is necessary to realize these goals, that is to promote freedom and to promote equality, what kind of state is necessary? Firstly, a state must not be run by the heads of any particular religion. This is the first necessary condition. See, when a state is governed directly by a priestly order, we call it as theocratic. Theocratic states examples include the Papal States of Europe in the medieval times or in the recent times, the Taliban controlled state. See, they lack separation between religious and political institutions and that is why they are known for their hierarchies and oppressions and reluctance to allow freedom of religion to members of other religious groups. So if we really value peace, freedom and equality, religious institutions and state institutions must be separated. Secondly, to be truly secular, a state must not only refuse to be theocratic but also it should not have any formal or legal alliance with any religion. And this is the second condition and these two conditions are necessary to realize the goals of secularism, which is nothing but promoting equality within as well as between religions and promoting freedom within religions. So far we saw about water secularism and what kind of state is necessary to promote secularism. Now, let us see what our constitutional secularism is made up of. See, we all know there are two concepts of secularism. The first one is western concept and the second one is Indian concept. See, the western concept of secularism connotes a complete separation between the religion and the state and this is the negative concept of secularism and it cannot be applied to Indian situation. Why is that? See, Indian society is multi-religious. So Indian constitution embodies the positive concept of secularism, which is nothing but giving equal respect to all religions and protecting all religions equally. And according to the author of the article, our constitutional secularism is marked by at least two features. What are those two features? Firstly, we give critical respect for all religions. See, just now I said unlike some secularisms, ours is not blindly anti-religious. Instead, it respects religion. Here also you should know that it respects not only one religion but it respects all religions. However, with the virtual impossibility of distinguishing the religious from the social, every aspect of religious doctrine or practice cannot be respected. This is a crucial point here. See, we cannot respect each and every aspect of the religion. Respect for religion must be accompanied by critic also. Let me explain this. See, the concept is very simple. Our state must respectfully leave religion alone. At the same time, it should also intervene whenever religious groups promote communal disharmony and discrimination on the grounds of religion. It should also intervene when they are unable to protect their own members from the oppressions. So from this, we can safely say that Indian concept of secularism, it respects all religion but the respect is accompanied by critic also. The second feature is that Indian state abandons strict separation but it keeps a principal distance from all religions. For example, it cannot tolerate untouchability and it cannot leave all personal laws as they are. Why it cannot do that? Because what if the personal laws are discriminatory? See, what is the main goal of secularism to promote equality, right? If a personal law is discriminatory, Indian state will intervene. And equally, it may non-preferentially subsidize schools run by the religious communities. Thus, it has to constantly decide when to engage or disengage, when to help or hinder religion depending entirely on which of the actions enhances the constitutional commitment to freedom, equality and fraternity. See, it is very simple. If a religious act promotes freedom, equality and fraternity, then in that case, Indian state will not intervene. If it violates the commitment to freedom, equality and fraternity, then in that case, Indian state will intervene. So, there is no strict separation but it keeps a principal distance from all religions. See, this type of constitutional secularism cannot be sustained by governments alone. It requires collective commitment from an impartial judiciary, media, civil society activist and an alert citizenry. Now, coming back to the article. See, in this article, the author mentions an informal term called party political secularism. This concept was born around 40 years ago. See, this is a doctrine practiced by all of the political parties. According to this type of secularism, political parties maintain an opportunistic distance from the religion. See, it means that they engage with the religion purely based on the benefits they derive from the engagement. For example, electoral benefits. And their disengagement with the religion is also based on this benefit only. So, if it benefits the party in the electoral times, then the party will engage with the religion. If the religion does not benefit the party in the electoral times, then the party will disengage with the religion. So, according to the author, this secularism has destroyed all the values from the core idea and it replaced the core idea with the opportunism because the political parties are using the engagement with the religion as an opportunity. So, now comes the question, what can be done? The author of this article suggests two crucial moves. Firstly, a shift of focus from a politically led project to a socially driven movement for justice. This can be done. And secondly, a shift of emphasis from inter-religious to intra-religious issues. See, this does not mean that we should completely ignore inter-religious issues. It means that focusing on intra-religious issue will give us an opportunity to explore resources within to construct new ways of living together. And that's all about the article given here. Now, let's have a quick recap. First of all, we saw what is secularism? It is a doctrine which seeks a secular society. Secular society means divide of either inter-religious or intra-religious domination. We saw the goals of secularism, which includes promoting freedom within religion, promoting equality between and within religion. And after that, we saw the conditions necessary to realize the secularism goals. Firstly, we saw a state should not be a theocratic state, which means it should not be run by the heads of any particular religion. And the second condition is that the state must not only refuse to be theocratic, but it also should not have any formal or legal alliance with any religion. And after that, we saw two concepts of secularism, the western concept, which is nothing but a complete separation between the religion and the state. This is the negative concept. And after that, we saw the Indian secularism, which is nothing but giving equal respect to all religions or protecting all religions equally. This is the positive concept. And after that, we saw two features of Indian secularism, the first one is, we give critical respect for all religions, but this respect must be accompanied by critic. And the second feature is that Indian state abandons strict separation, but keeps a principled distance from all religions. And after this, we saw an informal term called party political secularism, which is nothing but opportunity-based or benefit-based engagement with the religion. And finally, we ended our discussion by seeing two critical moves, which is shift of focus from politically led project to a socially driven movement for justice. And secondly, a shift of emphasis from inter-religious to inter-religious issues. And with these points in mind, now let us move on to the next article discussion. Look at this front-page article. The news article states that RBI is rising rates to reduce inflation. Here, they are talking about derepo rate. Yesterday, the Reserve Bank of India's Monetary Policy Committee voted anonymously to rise the repo rate by 50 basis points to 4.90%. And it is said that this has been done in a bid to slow down inflation. And this is the crux of the news article given here. So today, let us primarily focus on the steps taken by the government to control inflation. As you know, inflation is a rate of increase in prices over a period of time. It is typically a broad measure such as the overall increase in prices or the increase in the cost of living in a country. As we all know, there are three main causes of inflation. And based on that, the inflation is categorized. The first one is demand-pull inflation. The second one is cost-push inflation. And the third one is built-in inflation. Now look at this image here. See, demand-pull inflation, it happens when demand for goods and services exceeds the production capacity. Now the cost-push inflation, it happens when production cost, that is the cost of production, increases the prices of the product. Now coming to the third one, which is the built-in inflation, it is caused by price rise and the rise in wages. See here, the wages are getting increased in order to maintain living cost. So these are about the three categories of inflation. Now the two main indicators to measure inflation in India are the wholesale price index, WPI and the consumer price index, CPI. We have seen about them quite a lot of times in our discussion. Now moving on, let us see what steps can be taken by the government and the RBI to control inflation. See the steps taken by the RBI are known as monetary policy measures and the steps taken by the government are referred as fiscal measures. See, governments generally try to keep inflation within an optimal range that promotes growth without drastically reducing the purchasing power of the country. And for that to happen, firstly, government should control the prices. See price controls are the price caps mandated by the government and applied to specific goods. The government may lower the price or set it at an equilibrium price. For example, recently government announced an excise tax cut of rupees 8 per liter on petrol and rupees 6 per liter on diesel. See here, the government will bear the shortfall. What is the shortfall that government has to bear? In this case, see government was going to bear a shortfall of rupees 1 lakh crore due to the excise duty cut on petrol and diesel. Now secondly, RBI should opt for a contractionary monetary policy. See the goal of contractionary policy is to reduce the money supply within an economy by increasing the interest rate. This helps slow the economic growth by making credit more expensive which reduces the consumer and business spending. And for this to happen, the RBI can increase the CLR rate and the SLR rate. Now both will reduce the money circulation. And it may also increase the rate at which RBI lends to the commercial banks. Here we are talking about the repo rate and today's news was about this only. Now apart from this, government can take some other fiscal measures also. For example, government can reduce unnecessary expenditure. They can cut the personal consumption expenditure and for this to happen, the rates of personal, corporate and commodity taxes could be raised and even new taxes can be levied. But remember, the rate of the taxes should not be so high as to discourage saving, investment and production. Rather, the tax system should provide larger incentives to those who save, invest and produce more. Now the next is the public debt. See government can stop repayment of public debt and postpone it to some future date till the inflationary pressures are controlled within the economy. Instead, the government should borrow more to reduce money supply with the public. Now that's all about this news article. In this discussion, we saw what is inflation? It is the rate of increase in prices over a given period of time. And after that, we saw the three categories of inflation, demand-pull inflation, cost-push inflation, built-in inflation. When the demand is more and the production is less, demand-pull inflation happens. When the cost of production is high and it leads to increase in the prices of the product, cost-push inflation happens. Built-in inflation happens when the prices rise and it leads to rise in wages. We saw the two indicators to measure inflation, which is wholesale price index and consumer price index. And after that, we saw steps taken by the government and the Reserve Bank of India to control inflation. Government can control prices by announcing price caps. RBI can opt for a contractionary policy. They can increase the CLR rate, SLR rate. They can increase the rapport rate. And the other measures include reduction in unnecessary expenditure, cutting personal consumption expenditure, increasing the taxes rate and borrowing by the government to reduce money supply with the public. Now with these points in mind, let us move on to the next article discussion. See this news article here. It is about the removal of important state icons in the school textbook of Karnataka. See, Karnataka recently revised its school textbooks. It was done by a revision committee and there were allegations that chapters on social reformers and religious figures have been removed or severely distorted. This included chapters on freedom fighter Bahat Singh, Mysore ruler Tipusultan, Lingayath social reformer Basavana, Dravidian movement pioneer Periyar, reformers Narayana Guru, Swami Vivekananda etc. And today the news is that chapters of state icons of the Bhakti and Sufi movements have also been removed. So let us take this opportunity to know a few facts about Bhakti and Sufi movements. See they refer to the movement that advocated intense devotion or love for God. During this time there were different expressions of devotion which ranged from the routine worship of deities within temples to ecstatic adoration where the devotees attained a trance-like state. See trance-like state means it is a mental state in which you do not notice what is going on around you. So the expressions ranged from routine worship to a trance-like state. See singing and chanting of devotional compositions were also a part of such modes of worship. Now if we take Bhakti movement particularly it was part of Hindu tradition and it had many features. See it resulted in the emergence of poet saints as leaders around whom community of devotees developed and it also had a remarkable diversity. See we all know that under the orthodox Brahmanical framework Brahmanas were the important intermediaries between gods and devotees and here those who were termed as lower caste by the orthodox Brahmanical framework were considered ineligible for liberation and thus they were not included. But under the Bhakti movement the traditions also accommodated and acknowledged these so-called lower states along with women. So Bhakti movement included people having different social background thus it had a remarkable diversity. Now let us see some of the important phases in the Bhakti movement. First comes the Alvas Nayanas of Tamil Nadu. See these saints led some of the earliest Bhakti movements around 6th century. Here Alvas were the ones who were the devotees of Vishnu and Nayanas were the leaders who were devotees of Shiva. See some of the best known Nayanas were Appar, Sambandar, Sundarar, Manikavasagar and Karikalamayar. And the best known Alvas were Periyalvar and his daughter Andal, Tondaridipodi Alvar and Nammalvar. Now second comes the Veerashiva tradition in Karnataka. See the tradition emerged in the 12th century and it was led by a brahmana named Basavana. They worshipped Shiva. So his followers were known as Veerashivas meaning heroes of Shiva. They were also called as Lingayats meaning the wearers of Linga. Some of the well known Veerashivas were Alamaprabhu and Akamahadevi. And then comes the regional saint poets of Maharashtra. See this regional tradition focused on Vithala which is a form of Vishnu. So basically they were Vaishnavas. They insisted that Bhakti lay in sharing others' pain. So it gave a humanistic dimension to Bhakti. See they preferred to live with their families and they earned their livelihood like any other person and they served fellow human beings in need. And some of the well known regional saint poets were Janeshwar, Namdev, Eknaath, Tukaram, Sakubai and the family of Chokamela. And the next ones are the Naths, Yogis and Siddhas. See the Naths is short for Nathpanthis and Siddhas they are short for Siddhacharas. And Yogis they were also called as Yogis. See they were logical and they criticized the ritual and other aspects of conventional religion and social order. They mainly advocated renunciation of the world and they believed that path to salvation includes practices like yogasanas, breathing exercises and meditation. See the well known saints of this tradition include Adinatha, Matsyendranatha and Goraksanatha. Apart from this you should also know that all these Bhakti traditions led to a new wave in the Bhakti movement after the 13th century in North India. We'll just know some of the well known icons. It includes Kabir, Baba Guru Nanak, Tulsidas, Surdas, Shankaradeva of Azam, Dadudayal, Ravidas and Mirabai. See if you remember clearly Delhi Sultanate was also established in the 13th century and this led to the birth of Sufi tradition in India. So Sufi movement is a part of Islam. See the term Sufi refers to a group of religious minded people in Islam. See the Sufis turned to asceticism and mysticism. See asceticism means severe self-discipline and avoiding all forms of indulgence. See mysticism refers to the belief that contemplation and self-surrender will enable union with or absorption into God and the spiritual apprehension of knowledge. See Sufis protested against the growing materialism of the Caliphate as a religious and political institution. They also criticized the dogmatic definitions and the scholastic methods of interpreting the Quran and Sunnah. As we all know Quran is the Islamic sacred book and Sunnah is a part of Muslim law which refers to the traditions of the Prophet Muhammad. And instead of this Sufi sought an interpretation of Quran on the basis of their personal experience. So they laid emphasis on seeking salvation through intense devotion and love for God by following his commands and by following the example of Prophet Muhammad whom they regarded as a perfect human being. And apart from this they also developed elaborate methods of training under the guidance of a master. The training included using zikr, chanting of a name or a sacred formula, contemplation, sama, singing, rags, dancing, discussion of parables, breath control etc. See Sufi's composed poems expressing their feelings. And they also composed rich literature in prose. The prose included anecdotes and fables developed around them. And a Sufi tradition you should know about the silsilas. They were a genealogy of Sufi teachers. They all followed a slightly different method of instruction and ritual practice and this led to different Sufi centers or orders. And the most influential order was the Chisti Silsila. It had a long line of teachers like Kwaja, Muinuddin, Chisti of Ajmer, Kutbuddin, Bakhtiyar, Kaki of Delhi, Baba Farid of Punjab, Kwaja and Nizamuddin Auliya of Delhi, Bandhanavaz, Gisurudas of Gulbarga. And here also I have given some of the major teachers of the Chisti Silsila. Please go through it. And with this we have come to the end of the discussion. In this discussion we saw about Bhakti and Sufi movements. See they referred to the movement that advocated intense devotion or love for God. And the expressions ranged from routine worship of deities to a trance-like state. And singing chanting of devotional composition were a part of such worship. And after that we saw the features of Bhakti movement. It resulted in the emergence of poet saints as leaders and it had a remarkable diversity. And we saw some of the important phases of Bhakti movement. The first one is Alvas and Nayanas. Alvas were devotees of Vishnu and Nayanas were devotees of Ishiva. And after that we saw Veerashiva, tradition in Karnataka. It was led by Basavana. And the followers were called as Veerashivas. And they were also called as Lingayats. And after that we saw regional saint poets of Maharashtra. And the regional tradition is focused on Vithala which is a form of Vishnu. And this tradition is unique because it insisted that Bhakti lay in sharing others' pain. And the next ones were Naths, Jogis and Siddhas. They believed that the path to salvation includes practices like yogasanas, breathing exercises and meditation. And after that we saw about a new wave in the Bhakti movement after 13th century. And we saw some of the well-known icons of this wave. And after that we moved on to see about Sufi movement. See we saw that Sufis refers to a group of religious minded people in Islam. And they believed in asceticism and mysticism. Aceticism means severe self-discipline. And mysticism refers to the belief that contemplation and self-surrender will enable union with the God. And we also saw that they laid emphasis on seeking salvation through intense devotion or love for God by following his commands and by following the example of Prophet Muhammad. And we also saw that they developed elaborate methods of training under the guidance of Master. And they composed poems, prose, anecdotes and fables to express their feelings. And finally we ended our discussion by seeing silsalas in the Sufi tradition. They were a genealogy of Sufi teachers. And we saw some of the major teachers in the Chisti silsala. Now with these points in mind, let us move on to the next article discussion. See this news article here. It says that the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs has increased the minimum support price for all the mandated cariff crops for the season 2022-23. The Cabinet Minister, while announcing the price rise, mentioned that the MSP would give the farmers an indication of the price they would get and help them decide which crops to grow. And this is about the news article. In this context, let us see about the cropping seasons in India and the major crops grown under each season. First of all, what is the cropping season? Cropping seasons are the seasons in which a particular crop is grown. In our country, there are three distinct crop seasons. They are cariff, rabi and zed. Now let us take the cariff season. See the cariff season mainly coincides with the southwest monsoon season. This season falls between June to September. And during this season, tropical crops are grown. In this season, crops like rice, cotton, bajra, maize, jovar and tar are grown in the northern India. And in the case of southern India during the cariff season, rice, maize, ragi, jovar and groundnut are grown. If you can notice, the crops grown in the cariff season require a lot of water. And this is one of the reasons why their cultivation coincides with the southwest monsoon season. Now let us take the rabi season. See the rabi cropping season coincides with the onset of winter. And this season falls between October to March. Since this cropping season coincides with the onset of winter, temperate and sub-tropical crops are grown in this season. In this season, crops like wheat, gram, rapeseed, mustard and barley are grown in the northern India. We know that southern India, winters are not severe as it is closer to the equator. So in southern India, even during rabi season, tropical crops are grown. While discussing cariff crops, I mentioned that they are water consuming, right? See states like Tamil Nadu receive most of the rainfall during the retreating monsoon season. So the southern states can grow high water consuming tropical crops like paddy even during the rabi season. The other crops grown in the southern India during rabi season include maize, ragi, jovar and groundnut. And this is about the rabi cropping season. And finally, let us take the zide season. See zide is a short duration summer cropping season. And this cropping season starts immediately after the end of rabi crop harvest. The season falls between April to June. In northern India during the zide cropping season, crops like watermelons, cucumber, vegetables and fodder crops are grown. In the case of southern India, where the irrigation facilities are available, rice, vegetables and fodder crops are grown. And these are the three main cropping seasons in India. Now we will have a quick recap. We saw three cropping seasons, cariff season. It coincides with the southwest monsoon season and falls between June to September. In northern India, rice, cotton, bajda, maize, jovar and tarar grown. And in the southern India, rice, maize, ragi, jovar and groundnut are grown. These crops are water consuming crops. After that we saw about rabi season. It coincides with the winter and falls between October to March. Temporate and sub-tropical crops are grown in this season. In northern India, wheat, gram, rapeseed, mustard, barley are grown. During the season in southern India, tropical crops are grown because winters in southern India are not severe as it is closer to the equator. And the other reason is that southern state of Tamil Nadu receive most of the rainfall during the retreating monsoon season. So it can grow high water consuming tropical crops in rabi season. And finally we ended our discussion by seeing zade cropping season. It is a short duration summer cropping season falls between April to June. In northern India, watermelons, cucumbers, vegetables and fodder crops are grown. In southern India where the irrigation facilities are available, rice, vegetables and fodder crops are grown. Now with these points in mind, let us move on to the next part of our discussion that is the practice problems question discussion. See today we have three problems question. I will solve two of them and one of them is a quiz question for you. Let us solve this first previous problem question that was asked in the year 2021. The question says which one of the following is likely to be one of the most inflationary in its effects. Option A, repayment of public debt. Option B, borrowing from the public to finance a budget deficit. Option C, borrowing from banks to finance a budget deficit. And option D, creation of new money to finance a budget deficit. See the correct answer for this question is option D, it is because creation of new money to finance the deficit is the most inflationary. See in all the other cases, only circulation of money occurs, but not creation of new money into the economy. See new money infuses liquidity without any proportional asset to balance it. Creation of new money mostly leads to hyperinflation which refers to rapid and unrestrained price increase in an economy and it usually occurs at a rate exceeding 50% each month over time. See hyperinflation can occur in the times of war, an economic turmoil, in the underlying production economy and in conjunction with the central bank printing an excessive amount of money. So of all the options given here, option D is the most inflationary option. Now moving on to the second question, who among the following are Bhakti saints? Matsyendranatha, Namdev, Sambandar, Sakubhai. Select the correct answer from the code given below. See we saw in our discussion itself that all of these saints are Bhakti movement saints. So the correct option here is option D, 1, 2, 3 and 4. Now coming to the final question, this is a quiz question for you. Consider the following, 1, Aricanet, 2, Barley, 3, Coffee, 4, Finger Millet, 5, Ground Net, 6, Sismem, 7, Turmeric. The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs has announced the minimum support price for which of the above. Option A, 1, 2, 3 and 7 only. Option B, 2, 4, 5 and 6 only. Option C, 1, 3, 4, 5 and 6 only. Option D, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7. Think carefully and attempt this question. Don't worry even if you get it wrong. I'll let you know what is the right answer in the next analysis. Here I have given a main question for your practice. So interested aspirants, write it and post it in the comment section. If you have any queries related to the articles that we discussed today, post that also in the comment section. And don't forget to attempt the quiz question. And with this, we have come to the end. If you find the video useful, like, share and comment. And do subscribe to Shankara AS Academy's YouTube channel for further updates. Thank you.